Sauce for the goose

Sriram Ranganathan

Ganguly's suspension for a match and his and Dahiya's suspended sentences seem to have invoked a lot of indignation among cricket lovers in India. There is a public feeling of resentment about partiality, nepotism and downright racism against our players.

With so much of abuse and un-sportsmanlike behaviour going on in world cricket, it seems to be a fact that the Indians (along with the Pakis/Sri Lankans) always seem to get the rough end of things, though in relative terms, their offence is usually not very comparable to the ones by say McGrath, Ponting or even a newby like Telemachus (SA) or others from the not-third-world community.

Way back in 1991-92 when India toured Australia, Gavaskar made that observation about Indians playing against thirteen Australians, the non-playing two inflicting as much damage than the eleven abusive playing ones. Even after that, to look into the recent past on the Australian tour under Sachin's captaincy, McGrath and Ponting took boorishness to new levels and were termed extremely competitive cricketers for their efforts.

While taking nothing away from these great players (McGrath certainly evokes a lot of admiration, even though he is an Aussie and a pain in the neck when we play against Australia), there is no doubt about it that players from India, Pak and Sri Lanka (and I am sure Bangladesh will feel it too in the future) get the rough end of the stick whether it is ruling from match referees and umpires on un-sportsmanlike behaviour or whether it is controversies like chucking or match-fixing, where it seems that each existing evil can trace back its roots to the brown man.

In my opinion, we ask for it. Prem Panicker remarked in a recent newsletter that when you know someone is not going to get up and kick your back, there is a more of a sadistic pleasure in kicking that person. That is what is happening. The people responsible for the safeguarding of the Indian players' interests, the BCCI, simply does not a) have the time b) care enough c) have the guts to take up this issue at the levels it should be taken up at.

Let us take up the simple example of Telemachus roughly shouldering Dravid out of the way after being hit around a bit. One option before the players could be that in the way of street thugs, they pick up a couple of stumps and thump some sense into Telemachus's head. I know that sounds downright dirty and I am not advocating it as a workable option, just suggesting that option exists. Due to my own sportsmanlike mindset (as also the knowledge that if it comes down to a knock down fight, the Indian team would be rubbed clean into the ground by the muscular South Africans), I would ordinarily suggest that the players play decent and let the matter be taken up at higher levels where policy/management decisions are taken.

But for that we have to have a cricket board that cares enough about such sentiments. Our players are abused in the choicest of words and pushed around by opposing players and then fined by match referees for their own indiscretions. M***** F***** might be a casual term in some countries but it certainly is not in my country. Who can forget the classic Bodyline dialogue when the Aussie captain remarks to his players on being complained to by opposing captain Jardine -- "All right, which one of you bastards called this bastard a bastard."

Cultural differences, did you say? Working on the player's mind, did you say? Gee, how nice. Someone ought to tell the ICC referee panels that whatever might happen in their countries, for Indians, being called a bastard or a m***** f**** doesn't imply casual working on the batsman's mind and is definitely more abusive and humiliating than jumping in front of the umpire appealing vociferously.

You know what the real problem is here? Referee Jarman was absolutely right in penalizing Ganguly / Dahiya. They went overboard and there is no doubt on that score. They ought to be punished and in my opinion there is no doubt on that score either. Where the resentment arises is looking around in world cricket and seeing such gross nepotism.

Venkatesh Prasad gets fined for celebrating "too close" to the batsman. Ponting goes free after abusing Srinath, his lips being clearly readable on TV to everyone except the referee for that match. Sushma Swaraj surely would have fits if she knew such language was being used in prime time slots in our country where kids, women and men are almost equally mad about the game.

McGrath celebrates like my very ancient ancestors would have after making their daily dinner kill, but then he was not too close to Sachin when he did that in Australia, now was he? He was at least a couple of feet further away than Prasad was to the batsman whose dismissal he celebrated.

The real resentment is not against Jarman who even Ganguly will agree, has done the correct thing by putting his foot down at un-sportsmanlike behaviour. Umpire incompetence is something that is prevalent everywhere, in India, Pakistan and in Australia and South Africa and shouting/screaming at them is not and should not be a pardonable offence.

The resentment is against the ICC and its stuffed coats who strut around making righteous noises and then ignore its responsibilities towards enforcing a uniform set of rules for all countries under its umbrella, the emphasis here being on the word "all". The resentment is towards the Indian cricket board which makes us ashamed with its shamelessness at letting this crap go on.

Bullies kicking sand on wimps are something shown in so many Archies comics, but then those are comics. This is the comical real life case of a wimp kicking sand on the bully and the bully being scared to bury the wimp into the sand as deep as he can pound him.

The subcontinent nations have a lot of power in international cricket and some might even say they drive International cricket. But the feeling of the greatness of the white skin does not seem to have gone yet, looking at the meekness with which we submit to all the ICC's trash. The problem is not with Ganguly's suspension, the problem is with the feeling of "kick-Ind-Pak-SL-whenever-you-want" that is present in world cricket, aided by the subcontinent cricketing bodies themselves. It sucks.

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